Earth Notes

No one expects to see trees that look like jewels in the high desert of Arizona. But that’s exactly what visitors find in the Petrified Forest National Park – ancient logs preserved for millennia by a process that transfigured them into rare and beautiful stones.

Bread baking is on the rise in the time of COVID-19 as thousands of people stay home and cut down on trips to the grocery store.  Some bakers are using an heirloom type of wheat flour that’s come back in fashion recently; White Sonora Wheat.

Every once in a while, ponderosa pines turn out a lot more seeds than in an average year, as a hedge against obstacles that threaten their regeneration. Hurdles like high-severity fires – which deplete the soil of viable seeds – drastically hamper forest recovery.

Pablita Velarde is hardly a household name. But in the world of Southwest art, she is considered one of the greatest female painters of her generation. 

Fans of the prickly pear cactus might be familiar with recipes for cactus jelly, cactus candy, and fried cactus pads or nopalitos. But how about a recipe for a biodegradable plastic bag?